Kiss | Damon (Patreon)

The sweet scent of chocolate fills the kitchen air, and I smile as I breathe in.

“Have you eaten today?” A voice from across the counter drags me from my chocolate-induced daydream.

Damon spares me a single glance before turning his attention back to the icing he’s skillfully adding to the cake he’d just baked. He looks so calm, so at peace… so handsome. Biting the inside of my cheeks, I chase away the stray thought. He doesn’t need to see me swooning after him.

Again.

“Why, are you worried about me?” I decide to counter with a teasing edge to my voice. He’s always the one teasing me, this might just be my chance, he seems to be far too focused on his handiwork to push back.

“I’m worried you’re gonna start drooling all over the counter with your jaw hanging open like that, that’s why.”

Alas, my hopes are short lived once more. Oh destiny, why must thou be such a cruel mistress?

I glare at him, trying to disguise the pout on my lips. “I’m not drooling!”

“You were about to,” he chuckles, smiling as he straightens his back and gives his work a final once over as he pushes it further to the center of the counter. “There, now I’m done,” he looks at me. “What did you want with me, anyway?”

To steal a kiss as I do the dishes while you cook dinner, to hold your hand and play with your hair until you fall asleep while we make our way to our wedding reception in Nos Vega, I think.

“Nothing, I was just curious to see you baking,” I say.

Damon raises an eyebrow at me, clearly doubting my answer, and my cheeks start heating up under the intensity of his gaze.

I hate how clueless I get around Damon. I’ve been under his spell from the get-go, and despite all the ups and downs we’ve been through, this blasted crush of mine doesn’t seem to be getting any easier to handle.

On the bright side, Damon doesn’t seem to mind my company, but he also doesn’t seem to realize what all his flirtatious jokes and moves do to me -- or rather, he doesn’t seem to care.

Still, like a fool, I can’t keep away from him, and that’s what I’m doing here in the kitchen with him, in the middle of the afternoon, watching as he bakes a cake ‘out of sheer boredom’, or so were his words.

After a mere couple of seconds that felt like forever, he takes pity on me, laughing softly as he stretches his arms over his head. And I am most definitely not staring at the way his t-shirt sticks to his body, nor at how the muscles on his arms flex once he’s done. Nope, it wasn’t me.

“Well, you seem hungry regardless,” he shrugs, making his way around the island until he’s next to me, leaning against the counter as he speaks. “Feel free to take a slice, it’s chocolate.”

“You’re not having any?”

“Nah, I’m full.”

“Then why bake the cake?”

“I told you, I was bored,” his lips tilt into a crooked smirk, a mischievous glint in his eyes, leaning closer as if he’s about to share one of humanity’s greatest secrets. “And I was hungry when I started, but then I got tired of waiting and ate some of the batter while I waited for it to bake, and now I’m full.”

I can’t help but laugh at the ludicrous image etched in my brain now. “Don’t you know you shouldn’t eat batter?”

“What are you, my physician?” He clicks his tongue, jerking his head at the cake. “Go on, eat.”

I can’t deny I very much want a slice of this cake, so with a half-hearted sigh, I pull the plate closer, reaching for a knife.

“I could tell it was chocolate cake from the smell alone, but what’s the flavor on the icing?”

“Guess.”

“I don’t know, vanilla?” It is white frosting, after all.

“You suck at guessing.”

“I guessed once!”

“And you were wrong,” Damon cocks his head my way, a smug smile on his face. “Taste it.”

“So moody,” I mumble under my breath, earning a snorted laugh from him.

Tired of this pointless guessing game, I opt to take some frosting with my finger to taste it before I eat the cake. I know Damon isn’t one to play around with food, but then again… it is Damon.

With a generous amount on my index finger, I pop it in my mouth, closing my eyes as I lick it clean of the cold frosting.

“So?” Damon’s voice is still teasing, but it almost sounds tense, like he’s hiding what he’s truly feeling.

Again, not something that surprises me, Damon always hides something.

Pushing Damon out of the forefront of my mind for a moment, I focus on the flavor fest in my tongue. His food is always incredible, but this frosting? Ridiculous. It likely tastes even better with the damn cake.

There’s a certain hint that stands out, just enough to be memorable without being overbearing…

“Mint,” I say as I open my eyes, smiling at Damon.

He smiles back, giving me a slow nod. “Took you long enough.”

“You really like chocolate and mint, don’t you?” I ask, ignoring his jab.

Damon doesn’t reply, choosing instead to laugh as he points at the corner of his mouth. “Clearly not as much as you, seeing how you’re tryna stuff your face with it.”

“What!?” I quickly bring my hand to my lips, attempting to wipe them clean of whatever frosting got lost on its way, but my hand comes up clean. “There’s nothing there, Damon.”

“Yeah, there is.”

Suddenly, he’s too close. His face is a mere hairsbreadth away from mine, the scent of clean cotton from his t-shirt overpowering even the scent of the cake that surrounded us before, and for a moment I forget how to breathe while I look into the icy depths of his eyes.

And then, he kisses me.

Or, well, sort of.

Closing the distance between us, Damon leans his head to the side just enough to kiss the very corner of my mouth, too close to my lips to be a kiss on the cheek, yet too far from to be a real kiss.

It’s over just as soon as it happens, though. And I’m left speechless, blinking dumbly as I stare at Damon and the smug look on his face.

“There, now you’re clean,” he winks at me, pushing himself off the counter, giving me no time to neither process what just happened nor to say anything. “Oh, right.”

He comes to a stop right next to me, leaning in to whisper in my ear. “I really, really like chocolate and mint. Shame you didn’t try them both together.”

The heat from his breath tickles my skin even as his footsteps grow ever closer to the door.

Did he just--

I’m glad I’m sitting on a stool already, because my legs feel like jelly. I’m so out of it that I nearly jump out of my skin when I hear him calling out from the doorstep. “Enjoy the cake.”

The groan I let out is thankfully muffled by the whooshing sound of the door closing.

He knows. Damon knows exactly what he does to me, and clearly he enjoys torturing me. God, why can’t he just kiss me already?

I eye the cake in front of me for a brief second, and cut myself another slice, the knife sliding with ease through the soft layers of the cake as I focus on the chocolate-induced coma I’m about to put myself in.

They say you can’t have the cake and eat it too, and I guess that applies to Damon.

But not to this cake. This one I have, and I can and will eat it, or so help me.